A jury has recommended that Cork City Council carry out a review of all split-level sites in the city that pose a risk to the public following the death of an 18-year-old university student who died when he fell down a ten metre drop while on a night out.
The jury returned a verdict of accidental death at the inquest into the death of University College Cork student Caolan Mulrooney, who died in the fall off Quaker Road while on his way home to Rochestown in the early hours of December 2nd last.
Jeff Safarhanadi told how he had met Mr Mulrooney in Cubins nightclub at around 12.30am, and they had agreed to meet up with friends at Burgerking at 2.30am to get a taxi home but when he failed to show up, they presumed he had gone off with a friend, Eithne McSweeney.
Ms McSweeney said that she had met Mr Mulrooney in Cubins around midnight and while he had been drinking in the hour they spent together, he was drunk but he wasn’t staggering around the place and they had left the nightclub together at around 1am.
She realised she had left her jacket in the nightclub so she went back to retrieve it and she expected to find Mr Mulrooney waiting for her when she came back out but there was no sign of him and his phone rang out so she assumed he had made his own way home.
Det Sgt Shane Bergin said Mr Mulrooney’s parents, Eugene and Margaret contacted gardaí on December 2nd after their son failed to come home and a search was launched involving over 400 people including gardaí, Irish Coastguard, Civil Defence and family and friends.
Gardaí examined 115 CCTV tapes and found 10 sightings of Mr Mulrooney with the last sighting of him at Fort Street at 1.19am as if he was heading towards Rochestown, said Det Sgt Bergin, adding there was no evidence of Mr Mulrooney being chased by anyone.
Motorcycle shop owner, John Meehan told how he was getting some perspex from a store area at the back of his premises on Blue Angel Lane, off Douglas Street to repair a canopy on December 6th when he spotted a body in a narrow passageway at the back of his yard.
Det Sgt Bergin said it appeared Mr Mulrooney had gone down East View Terrace, a cul-de sac off Quaker’s Road and climbed over an ivy covered wall which was just 1.5-metres high but which had a drop on the other side of some 10 metres and fell into Mr Meehan’s yard.
Pathologist, Dr Margaret Bolster said that Mr Mulrooney suffered catastrophic brain injuries in the fall and she said that his death was due to brain contusion, swelling, laceration and meningeal haemorrhage due to a fall from a height.
Dr Bolster said Mr Mulrooney would have been rendered unconsious immediately and died soon after, and this was supported the fact that his blood alcohol level was 161 mls per 100mgs relative to his alcohol urine level of 212mls per 100mgs.
Cork City Coroner Dr Myra Cullinane said it was not the first such inquest that she had to deal with in Cork where somebody fell over a wall with a significant drop on the other side, and afterwards the Mulrooney family welcomed the jury’s recommendation that Cork City Council carry out a review of all split-level sites in the city that pose a risk to the public.
